


in the old photos

by theafterimages



Series: playground [4]
Category: GOT7, 룸메이트 | Roommate (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Gen, Moving, Separations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-14 05:27:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9164149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theafterimages/pseuds/theafterimages
Summary: Youngji had been sure she knew what life after high school would be like, but Jackson has news that changes everything.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Day 9! I'd like to wrap up this AU this year, too. It should only take one more installment, but that one might be on the longer side, so I'm not entirely sure if it will get done or not. We'll see.

Something’s wrong with Jackson.

Youngji doesn’t have to draw on their years of friendship to know that. Jackson makes all of his feelings obvious, including when he’s unhappy, but this is beyond that—he’s been quiet ever since he got to her house an hour ago, and even clingier than usual.

“Okay, what?” she finally asks in exasperation, breaking off halfway through her story about her history project with Sohyun because she can’t take how Jackson keeps staring at her, like he’s worried she’ll disappear if he blinks. 

“What?” he asks immediately.

“Don’t say ‘what’, you’re being really weird and you know it.” She crosses her arms, which is hard to do given how tightly he’s hugging her. “What is it?”

Jackson would normally try to pretend nothing is wrong, then abruptly give in and spend ten minutes spilling every tiny detail about whatever it is that’s bothering him. Today, though, he sighs quietly and somehow clutches her even tighter, pressing his lips to her shoulder in something that’s not so much a kiss as him still trying to hide from saying whatever it is that’s bothering him. 

Youngji elbows him, scoffing at his exaggerated noise of pain. “Just tell me-”

“Dad got a job offer,” Jackson blurts out. “In Hong Kong.”

Youngji goes very still. “What?”

“They’re taking it,” Jackson says overtop her, like now that he’s started he can’t stop.

“Are you-” She swallows, barely able to bring herself to ask. “Are you going with them?”

He nods. “Dad’ll be traveling with the team a lot, and Mom needs someone to take care of her. She needs me.”

_I need you_ , Youngji wants to say, but she knows that’s unfair. “Hong Kong?” is all she says instead, her voice tiny. That’s not how next year is supposed to work at all. She has been accepted to UCLA, and Jackson had been planning to take a gap year, to work and travel and take more time to decide what it is he eventually wants to go to college for. Jackson is supposed to be _here_. He’s not supposed to leave her.

She’s not sure who starts it, but both of them are crying before long. It’s always been that way for them—when one of them starts to tear up, the other follows suit.

“We’ll still call and text and Skype,” Jackson chokes out, because that’s another thing that has always been true: no matter how upset he is, he always tries to comfort her before worrying about himself.

“It’s not the same,” Youngji insists, and cries harder in Jackson’s arms. This has always been one of the safest places in her world, and she doesn’t even know how to imagine Jackson being out of her reach.

 

 

 

Three months later, Jackson still hasn’t wrapped his head around the idea. He’s always loved Hong Kong and wished he could spend more time there, but he loves California, too. He’s lived in the same house his whole life, and now he’ll be so far away from everything and everyone he’s always known; from Mark and Kangjoon and Amber and _Youngji_.

Jackson and Youngji are more inseparable than ever in the weeks leading up to his move. Youngji’s mother gives them identical shift schedules at the coffee shop without either of them asking, and even assigns them fewer hours, although she assures Youngji that she’ll make up the lost time once Jackson leaves. They try to spend all their free time together, whether they’re with a group of friends or it’s just the two of them, watching a movie at Youngji’s house or packing Jackson’s stuff.

They hadn’t slept over at each other’s houses since starting high school, but for the week leading up to his move they make an exception. Jackson spends every night on an air mattress in Youngji’s room until the last one, when he and Youngji try to stay up all night and end up falling asleep together on her queen-sized bed.

Jackson wakes up to find daylight streaming in through the blinds and Youngji staring at him. “Creep,” he mumbles teasingly. She makes a face at him, though she doesn’t fight it when he pulls her into his arms. “What time is it?”

“Ten,” Youngji says. “We should get up.” But instead she presses her face against his neck.

“Yeah, okay,” he says, and doesn’t move. He strokes her tangled hair, trying not to think about how this is it, his last day in California; how he’s spent his whole life with Youngji, how he’s been with her through _everything_ , and now they’re going to be sixteen hours apart. He still can’t wrap his head around it, around the idea of Youngji being someone he visits instead of someone who’s always right by his side.

“You can come with us,” he offers, not for the first time that week. “I’ll buy your plane ticket.”

She laughs quietly. “Oh yeah, that’ll be great—‘okay, Mom and Dad, I have to cancel all my college plans and go live with Jackson in Hong Kong.’”

“They’ll understand.”

Youngji sighs as he pulls her even closer. “You’re going to have to let go of me sometime, Jackson.”

“Nope,” he debates. “I’m taking you on the plane. You can be my carry-on.”

He can hear her swallow. “I wish you could,” she admits, and he closes his eyes, resting his face against her hair.

Everything’s going to be different now. They’ll still talk all the time, obviously, but that’s not the same as her being _right there_. They won’t work shifts at the coffee shop together, won’t constantly be at each other’s houses. Youngji will hang out with their other friends without him. Jackson’s going to have to rely on Mark’s judgment about the guys she dates instead of vetting them himself. 

Jackson clutches her closer at the idea of how the next guy she wakes up with might not deserve her at all, and she grunts and hits his shoulder. “Can’t breathe.”

“Sorry,” he says quickly, and when he lets go she wiggles out of his arms.

“Come on, up,” Youngji says, backhanding his stomach lightly and giving him what he knows is a forced smile. “You have a lot to do today, and I need food.”

“Fine,” Jackson grumbles as he obeys, even though all he really wants to do is pull her back into bed and curl around her and stay.


End file.
